The Ram's Horn Incident
Esau sold his birthright, with all that it implied, for a mess of pottage. Infant communities, whether territorial or municipal, feeling the pressure of present want, are always tempted by money-sharks to mortgage, sell, or surrender, for a mere song, rights and franchises of a constantly increasing income, and relinquish political power necessary for a legitimate assertion and protection of their rights in years to come. A striking exemplification of this short-sightedness appears in what is said above as to the formation of only three States to cover the whole Pacific Coast. The supplicant for this birthright, and all its prospective enormous income, finds his most congenial and hospitable host in a municipal legislature. He is usually, but not always, accompanied by the fascinating Miss Graftis.
There are two cases in our municipal history that I will briefly note as illustrations of this tendency. In neither, so far as I know and believe, was there any graft. In both I was to some extent officially connected; in the Rams-Horn case painfully so; in the Railroad Avenue case simply as an officer and protestant. Many years ago—the dates are not important—the Columbia and Puget Sound Railroad Company asked the City Council of Seattle for the grant of a right-of-way for a railroad track down and over West Street. This was the historic Ram's-Horn. I and a few others opposed the grant. The City Council hesitated. Its members desired the approval of the grant by the people, and especially by the lot-owners along the street, before they acted. A meeting was called at the Pavilion to secure, if possible, such approval. The meeting was fairly attended. Mr. James McNaught, a shrewd and able man and lawyer, was attorney for the Company. He read the proposed ordinance and explained its provisions, and then, with a glowing eulogy on the advantages of a railroad, closed amid the vociferous applause of the audience. I arose to oppose the grant; but as there was a continuous and determined cry of "Vote!" "Vote!" "Vote!" "Vote!" I resumed my seat. The proposed ordinance was approved by about a two-thirds vote of those present, and the City Council speedily enacted it into law. The Railroad Company built its road from the south end of the town and laid its track down to Columbia Street; there it stopped, to await the result of certain condemnation proceedings. The wearers of the shoe, although voting for its purchase, soon felt its pinch, and they wanted compensation for its pain. The Company threatened to go across Columbia Street. It was stopped by a judicial restraining order. Having been elected Corporation Counsel, I came into the case a short time before the hearing on the motion made by the Company for the vacation of this order. The former legal adviser of the City, and who had commenced the suit, I asked to continue in the case and to argue the pending motion. He did so, and made a technical and very ingenious argument against the validity of the grant. I must confess that I believed the ordinance valid, and that the objections urged against it were unsound, and I was fully convinced the Court would so hold. In the mean time Columbia Street had been graded and macadamized. Its surface was fully eighteen inches above the railroad track. Being fully informed by a careful personal inspection, and thorough measurement by experts, of the exact fact, I proposed to compromise. I first proposed to allow the Company to cross Columbia Street, but to cross at the existing grade. This would require a reconstruction of the tracks already finished, and subject the Company to many suits for damages in case of their change of grade. Secondly, I agreed to withdraw the pending suit if this proposal was accepted by the Company. This all took place in open Court, and the compromise was approved in open Court; the ordinance, at the request of the Company's attorney, was declared valid by the Court. The compromise was also approved.
The next morning, to my astonishment, a large force of men was put at work by the Company to cut through Columbia Street; basing its action on the alleged ground that the compromise was null and void because of a mutual mistake of the facts by the parties. There was no mutual mistake. I fully knew and understood all of the facts.
An incipient riot was in progress; but the interference of the police and the issuance of a restraining order soon put an end to operations. The newspapers emptied their vials of wrath on me as the principal sinner.
An appeal was taken by the Company to the Supreme Court, and that learned and unimpassioned tribunal affirmed every position taken by me in the case; it held the ordinance to be valid and the compromise binding. Thus, ended the somewhat celebrated Ram's-Horn case, and with it that railroad across Columbia Street.
On the publication of the decision of the Supreme Court, it was amusing to see my calumniators retreat to cover; still damning, however, with faint praise.